Joseph Bruchac lives in the Adirondack
mountain foothills town of Greenfield Center, New York, in the same house where
his maternal grandparents raised him. Much of his writing draws on that land
and his Abenaki ancestry. Although his American Indian heritage is only one
part of an ethnic background that includes Slovak and English blood, those Native
roots are the ones by which he has been most nourished. He, his younger sister
Margaret, and his two grown sons, James and Jesse, continue to work extensively
in projects involving the preservation of Abenaki culture, language and traditional
Native skills, including performing traditional and contemporary Abenaki music
with the Dawnland Singers.

He holds a B.A. from Cornell University, an M.A. in Literature
and Creative Writing from Syracuse and a Ph.D. in Comparative Literature from
the Union Institute of Ohio. His work as a educator includes eight years of
directing a college program for Skidmore College inside a maximum security prison.
With his late wife, Carol, he founded the Greenfield Review Literary Center and The Greenfield Review Press. He has edited a number of highly
praised anthologies of contemporary poetry and fiction, including Songs from
this Earth onTurtle's Back, Breaking Silence (winner of an
American Book Award) and Returning the Gift. His poems, articles and
stories have appeared in over 500 publications, from American Poetry Review,
Cricket and Aboriginal Voices to National Geographic, Parabola
and Smithsonian Magazine. He has authored more than 120 books for adults
and children, including The First Strawberries, Keepers of the Earth
(co-authored with Michael Caduto), Tell Me a Tale, When the Chenoo
Howls (co-authored with his son, James), his autobiography Bowman's Store
and such novels as Dawn Land, The Waters Between, Arrow Over
the Door and The Heart of a Chief. Forthcoming titles include Squanto's
Journey (Harcourt), a picture book, Sacajawea (Harcourt), an historical
novel, CrazyHorse's Vision (Lee & Low), a picture book, and Pushing
Up The Sky (Dial), a collection of plays for children. His honors include
a Rockefeller Humanities fellowship, a National Endowment for the Arts Writing
Fellowship for Poetry, the Cherokee Nation Prose Award, the Knickerbocker Award,
the Hope S. Dean Award for Notable Achievement in Children's Literature and
both the 1998 Writer of the Year Award and the 1998 Storyteller of the Year
Award from the Wordcraft Circle of Native Writers and Storytellers. In 1999,
he received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Native Writers Circle of
the Americas.

As a professional teller of the traditional tales of the Adirondacks
and the Native peoples of the Northeastern Woodlands, Joe Bruchac has performed
widely in Europe and throughout the United States from Florida to Hawaii and
has been featured at such events as the British Storytelling Festival and the
National Storytelling Festival in Jonesboro, Tennessee. He has been a storyteller-in-residence
for Native American organizations and schools throughout the continent, including
the Institute of Alaska Native Arts and the Onondaga Nation School. He discusses
Native culture and his books and does storytelling programs at dozens of elementary
and secondary schools each year as a visiting author.

Selected List of Awards include:
American Book Award for Breaking Silence
Horn Book honor for The Boy Who Lived with the Bears
Scientific American Children’s Book Award for The Story of the Milky Way
Cherokee Nation Prose Award
Hope S. Dean Award for Notable Achievement in Children’s Literature
2005 Virginia Hamilton Literary Award
2001 Parents Guide to Childrens' Media Award for Skeleton Man
2000 Parents Choice Gold Award for Crazy Horse's Vision
1999 Lifetime Achievement Award from the Native Writers Circle of the Americas
1999 Jane Addams Childrens Book Award for Heart of a Chief
1998 Writer of the Year Award from the Native Writers Circle of the Americas
1998 Storyteller of the Year Award from the Native Writers Circle of the Americas
1997 Paterson Award for Dog People
1996 Boston Globe Book Award for The Boy Who Lived with the Bears
1995 Knickerbocker Award